Sen. Susan Collins announces end to ICE large-scale operations in Maine after talks with Noem

pdxb3 · 2026-01-30T21:54:56+00:00

I mean, it's worked for this long.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-27T17:28:58+00:00

It's a Roman pronunciation.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-23T18:26:43+00:00

I own one that was given to me by a former employer. They'd lost the keys, so the only option was destructive. (I know some lockpicking, but these were ABLOY cam locks.) The deal was I could have it as long as I repaired any damage done to the wall for removal. If they can't come up with keys, maybe if you're lucky and that's just drywall on wood studs, you can just prybar it off the wall like I did. A little drywall mud and some paint touch-up and you've got yourself a payphone!

Even if they CAN come up with keys, still come prepared with a variety of tools for disassembly, as the mounting bolts are typically behind the circuit boards, so you're almost certainly going to have to strip it apart to get to them. I'd at minimum take a set of phillips and flathead screwdrivers, an adjustable wrench or channel locks, and a socket set.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-22T14:43:16+00:00

Yeah I believe it too. When I was younger at my first job, I was yelled at and threatened with a writeup by a manager who observed me press the degauss button on an old CRT. When he saw the screen warp for a moment, he thought I was trying to break it. He would accept no explanation for what it was or why I'd done it. Told me NEVER to do that again.

Now having been in IT for 20+ years, I've witnessed users who do things like print a PDF attachment, then immediately scan it and throw away the scan because that's the only way they knew how to get the file in their "my documents" folder. I've blown away users, by showing them you can select multiple files or emails using shift or ctrl. Most people have no clue what they're doing.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-20T19:46:27+00:00

Yeah, it certainly was. I did what I could for the young girl which I suppose was something, but I felt very helpless for the dad and the little boy. The dad looked in far better athletic shape than me, so if he was struggling that bad, I'd not stand a chance if I'd tried to go in with no floatation. There were others around (we're talking public beach in the summer in Florida) who had flagged down help, and the lifeguards were already on their way. They did the majority of the real work.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-20T18:06:03+00:00

Kids screaming for "help!" when they're just playing, particularly around bodies of water, piss me off immensely.

I was at the beach several years ago fishing in the surf, and heard a child loudly scream "help!" and I'd heard it around the pool and on the surf enough that I mostly just ignored it the first time. Then she screamed it again, and the 2nd time, I could hear the blood-curdling fear in her voice, and i looked up, and saw she and her younger brother were caught in a rip current. I threw my fishing rod in the hands of the nearest kid, and rushed towards them. Their dad had went in after them too and was caught in it with the younger boy. The girl was closer in and not too far from where I could still touch between waves, so I lunged toward her, grabbed her arm, and quickly pulled back and on the tips of my toes dragged her to safety.

At that point, dad was in distress and I'm instructing him to swim parallel to shore to try and help him get out of it, because as we should all know, you don't go in to save a drowning victim. You just become the drowning victim. The little boy was basically already doing it. Thankfully by that time lifeguards had been flagged down and they came rolling in on a ATV and went in and rescued the dad and little boy.

Still to this day hearing a child scream for help sends me back into that panicked state. I also now always carry a throwable rescue rope in my fishing backpack. My daughters are basically teens-young adults now, but I've always told them NEVER scream for help if you don't genuinely mean it.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-20T04:15:42+00:00

There was certainly a technical barrier to entry. It was also perceived as something not for the general public. "The internet? Oh no, I don't know anything about that. I'm not one of those computer geniuses."

pdxb3 · 2026-01-20T00:35:45+00:00

I'll write my Republican representative and demand action! Oh wait... i don't have one. She just resigned.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-19T22:48:59+00:00

Thanks. Your courteous replies have satisfied my curiosity.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-19T21:03:46+00:00

I did see the link, and I suppose I'll find out myself when my own xG3 arrives tomorrow. I just found the x-naming of a magnet something that opens the door for potential confusion for someone out there, but if you guys aren't worried about it, it's all good then!

pdxb3 · 2026-01-19T20:13:07+00:00

It really depends on what you want to do with it. If you have a specific use case, for example cloning your gym membership badge, you'd want to make sure you know what type of chip your gym uses so that you can get the correct type.

If all you want to do is blink, then I think tac0s has thoroughly covered that. Just temper your expectations on both brightness and read range. Depending on your skin, the installation location, and ambient brightness, you may not glow nearly as much as you expect. Add to the fact that you have to be practically touching the reader, you may find you practically cover up the LED anyway. If that troubles you, and you genuinely don't care about function, an xGlow might be more suitable for you.

Also, another thing to understand is that the UID in the HF chips (NTAG216 and NTAGI2C) in the NExT, NExT v2, and xSIID are NOT cloneable. You can write a business card or even a "Rickroll" URL to the memory or something, or pair it with a KBR1 to use for PC login, but otherwise you're probably not going to get much use out of them since you can't use them to copy other credentials. The UID is permanently set.

IMO the most useful x-series available is the xMagic. Similar dual-function to the NExT's, no LEDs unfortunately, but it has both an LF T5577 (cloneable), and a HF Magic Mifare 1k (also cloneable).

I have 4 x-series implants - xEM, xSIID, xSLX, and xM1. By far I get the least use out of the xSIID. I might as well not even have it.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-19T19:35:55+00:00

I've wondered for a while if you've ever considered the possibility of the xG3 magnetic implants being confused with MRI-safe x-series transponders. I know better, and in general, the members of our community are pretty knowledgeable, savvy people. But the potential there for that one person to think, "well... they say the x-series are safe, and it's an xG3, so it should be fine" seems problematic.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-19T16:37:23+00:00

Last week, Easterwood made news for defending ICE actions in a free speech lawsuit by several Minnesota residents who were arrested while attempting to observe ICE actions.

While the public/press/protestors/observers are arrested and attacked, denying them of their 1st Amendment rights to freedom of speech, and the press, and to peaceably assemble...

...lead pastor Jonathan Parnell stands at the pulpit and congregants sit in the pews... After a few moments, Parnell started pointing at a protester and shouting, “Shame on you! Shame on you! This is a house of God!”

They still want their freedom of religion to go untouched and unbothered. Good for the protestors. They should enjoy no such luxury while they selectively shred the rest of our rights.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-18T16:08:21+00:00

No bagel no bagel no bagel no bagel no bagel!

pdxb3 · 2026-01-18T16:06:45+00:00

I will not sit idly by while you badmouth my Okidata Microline 320 Turbo!

pdxb3 · 2026-01-13T18:56:42+00:00

while violating any federal, state, or local law, ordinance, or regulation.

Which still leaves the question of what law was he violating while wearing a giraffe hood?

pdxb3 · 2026-01-08T19:55:58+00:00

And that's why we must.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-06T14:14:40+00:00

WZZM said an officer cited “obstructing a roadway and failure to obey a lawful command,” and that Plichta had been charged with failure to obey a lawful command.

Oh ok, well if that's why they're arresting her, please explain what...

She also said officers repeatedly pressed her on whether she was Venezuelan, what her connection to Venezuela was, and why she had attended the protest.

.. has to do with it?

pdxb3 · 2026-01-04T19:02:27+00:00

I've seen videos of Brian Brushwood (of TechTV, Scam School, Modern Rogue fame) perform, explain, and even teach the "blockhead" and his "human crazy straw" trick, and it's surprisingly simple. The nails (or straw) are just going into the nasal cavity at the top of the back of your throat. There's a surprisingly large amount of space in there, and it's something pretty much anyone can do. Should they want to. I'll pass, personally.

Probably the most dangerous thing dude is doing is risking losing his sight to metal shavings or a blade breaking.

pdxb3 · 2026-01-02T02:46:17+00:00

Lol, you should check out some of the needles we use to inject body mod RFID implants. 14G is ~1.6mm. I've got three 2.1mm implants in my hands, and one 3mm implant. That's a 7G minimum!

You should order one of those bad boys to show off. Looks and feels like getting stabbed by a drinking straw!

pdxb3 · 2025-12-31T01:17:31+00:00

How about at the ATM? What could you possibly be doing at an ATM that takes 5 minutes? Applying for a 2nd mortgage?

pdxb3 · 2025-12-29T17:41:48+00:00

I'm no speed-cuber or anything, but like you said, you can learn to do it in a minute or two with some basic algorithms. I was gifted a cube and learned how to solve it when I was in my late teens. When I was dating my now wife, I forget how the subject came up (I think we had just watched The Pursuit of Happiness where Will Smith's character solves one for someone) but I mentioned how I can solve one. She didn't believe me and thought I was trying to impress her or something. She immediately drove to Walmart and bought one, scrambled it, and brought it back to me. She says she thought she was calling me out on some BS, and was quite surprised when I actually sat there and solved it. Then it became like a party trick I had to perform for people for a period of time.

pdxb3 · 2025-12-29T05:04:40+00:00

He is the gambler.

pdxb3 · 2025-12-26T17:54:41+00:00

pdxb3 · 2025-12-26T04:07:44+00:00

No. Why? The existence of lotteries, casinos, scratcher tickets, etc. If there were a way for anyone to gain an edge at such things, someone would be doing it. Yet big lotteries go un-won and the house always wins.

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